I'm back in LA, so back to donabe cooking!
In this past Maui trip, we realized we didn't eat any meat during the entire stay. We just wanted to eat as much local seafood as possible. After coming back home, we felt like we want fish even more. So, I decided to make donabe bouillabaisse. For this dish, I used the classic-style all-purpose donabe.
From Fish King, I got the nice sashimi grade hamachi (yellowtail), large shrimp, scallop, and little neck clams. Everything except for the clams were seasoned with salt and pepper before being cooked.
Onion, ginger, garlic, fennel seed powder and saffron threads were sauteed in donabe before deglazed with sake and the fish stock and tomato sauce were added. My homemade miso was dissolved in the broth right before the seafood was added. After simmering with the lid on, the Japanese-style donabe "miso" bouillabaisse was ready.
The dish was fantastic!! Miso and saffron created the really nice aroma and the broth was just so tasty. I thought I want to drink this broth every morning. The seafood was cooked so perfectly and the hamachi was especially so meaty. In a relatively short time cooking, all the flavors got nicely integrated thanks to donabe. It was served with the donabe rice...I cooked short grain rice with an addition of red quinoa. And, of course(!), I enjoyed dipping the rice in the miso-saffron broth. Righteous.
I posted the recipe on toiro's website. Please check it out.
Happy donabe life.
